Plans to upgrade the West Milford (NJ) Police Department's current communications room and add necessary equipment to operate the enhanced 911 system now require adding a climate-controlled storage facility outside town hall since there is little to no storage space left in the municipal building, according to an October 14 posting on northjersey.com
At the October 7 council meeting, Police Chief Paul Costello said that Verizon consultants agreed that there is no room left for the necessary equipment in the building since the boiler room can no longer be used to store communications equipment. Therefore, a 14-by-10 structure will need to be placed outside the police department's wing of town hall (a cost of $27,000.)
According to Chief Costello, in order to house the equipment in town hall, the current configuration would require them (the police department) to store critical supplies like ammunition, firearms and documents outside the department. Short of some "extra space" suddenly bring created, an outdoor facility would be required to complete the nearly $1.8 million project to upgrade both the department's communications center and squad car equipment.
There has been discussion that a local library was going to be donated (which the police department has discussed a possible "housing" option), but that "potential donation" is years away. Costello added that in the event the department was to move to the current library (if and when a new facility is built), the storage unit could simply be moved along with the department.
According to West Milford Township Administrator Kevin Boyle, there is no need to approve any more money, as it was previously budgeted. Costello added that there was a $50,000 allocation to cover extra expenditure costs, which can cover the expense of the proposed climate-controlled room. However, since it was absent from the original communication center's renovation plans, the storage facility would be an added, nonetheless.
Boyle emphatically stated that without the storage facility, the thousands of dollars spent towards enhancing the 911 equipment (for the area’s cell phone towers) would simply go to waste. He added that he approved the storage unit in the spring, as the township simply does not have enough room in town hall with the current configuration of municipal departments.
"If you don't put this (enhanced 911) system in," he said, "everything you have upgraded is worthless."
Ultimately, the council agreed to authorize the addition of the outdoor facility, which, according to Boyle, should enable the department to put the system online in January, 2010.